Evaluation is an important part of Roots of Hope. As much as we just want to roll up our sleeves and do the work, we want to stop and reflect to make sure what we are doing is having an impact. We also want to understand why and how our work is making a difference. Our efforts need to be thoughtful and mindful of the people we are working with and their time and capacity to support evaluation. We are looking for people to help support this work – both those with evaluation experience and those who would like to learn.
“Complex environments for social interventions and
innovations are those in which what to do to solve problems is uncertain and key stakeholders are in conflict about how to
proceed. Informed by systems thinking and sensitive to complex nonlinear
dynamics, developmental evaluation supports social innovation and adaptive
management. Evaluation processes include asking evaluative questions, applying
evaluation logic, and gathering real-time data to inform ongoing decision
making and adaptations.”
― Michael Quinn Patton, Developmental Evaluation
Formative evaluation considers if a new program or program activity is feasible, appropriate, and acceptable while it is being developed and help us understand what needs to be changed or modified. Summative evaluation looks at the impact of an intervention on a target population to find out what the project achieved and determine if continuing to support the project makes sense.
Community suicide prevention is not well researched or evaluated resulting in less understanding of what is impactful and effective. We support people working in the community to develop their research and evaluation skills through mentoring and workshops.